What if Everything You Know about 9/11 is Wrong?

[Guest guest]

Saturday, June 11, 2005 2:58 PM

What if Everything You Know about 9/11 is

Wrong?

 

 

> Interview with David Ray Griffin...rwr

>

> What if Everything You Know about 9/11 is Wrong?

> by Bruce David and Carolyn Sinclair, August 2005

>

> Scanned PDF with images: http://911truth.org/docs/drgHfull.pdf

>

> We all know what happened on September 11, 2001 - Osama bin Laden inspired

> 19 Muslim extremists to hijack commercial airplanes and fly them into the

> World Trade Center and Pentagon. But what if it didn't happen that way at

> all?

>

> David Ray Griffin is a professor of theology, a well-respected scholar and

> author of more than 20 books, including The 9/11 Commission Report:

> Omissions and Distortions and The New Pearl Harbor: Disturbing Questions

> About the Bush Administration and 9/11. Griffin maintains that the

> evidence contradicts the government's official story and that, so far,

> nobody's come up with a theory that can account for all of the facts.

>

> At HUSTLER we believe the murder of 2,98fi innocent people demands hard

> questions and digging deeper. We're especially troubled by the collapse of

> Building 7, but we're determined to keep an open mind. As such, we sit

> down with Griffin to discuss what appear to be disturbing inconsistencies

> with the government's story.

>

> HUSTLER: You've compiled a record of the facts-but are they beyond

> dispute?

>

> DAVID RAY GRIFFIN: I simply gather research that has been done by others,

> a lot of it based on mainline stories from The New York Times, The Boston

> Globe and The Guardian and so on. These reports tend to, more or less,

> contradict the official theory.

>

> You say there's reason to question the government's official position on

> Osama bin Laden.

>

> One problem with the official theory of the attacks being pulled off

> entirely by the 19 men named as al Qaeda terrorists is that six of them

> have, subsequently, shown up very much alive. This has been reported in

> the BBC, but not in the American mainstream press. One guy even walked

> into the U.S. Embassy and asked what was this nonsense about his having

> died on 9/11?

>

> What are some other problems with the official story?

>

> The government had every reason to know this was going to happen. There

> were some 52 warnings of the attack, many of which the Bush Administration

> didn't see fit to have released until after the inauguration. A little bit

> came out during the 9/1 1 hearings. For example, Condoleezza Rice-who had

> been describing the famous August 6, 2001, memo from British intelligence

> as merely historical in nature-was forced to admit that the title of it

> was " Bin Laden Determined to Strike within the United States. " Many people

> have thought that was the strongest evidence of foreknowledge-but not at

> all.

>

> Another example involves David Schippers, the attorney who prosecuted Bill

> Clinton and is highly thought of in Republican circles. Schippers says he

> called up Attorney General John Ashcroft repeatedly to tell him that FBI

> agents were warning of an attack, that they knew the date and said it was

> going to be in Lower Manhattan. Schippers couldn't get the Attorney

> General's office to call him back. The New American, a conservative

> political magazine, interviewed these FBI agents and confirmed their

> story.

>

> Further evidence of foreknowledge involves the Secret Service's seeming to

> not only know the attacks were coming, but know who was targeted and who

> was not. That morning [of September 11], Bush was in a classroom in

> Sarasota, Florida, publicizing his education program. After the second

> building was struck, there could be no doubt the country was under attack.

> Yet Bush just sat there for about ten minutes.

>

> Many people have criticized the President for not getting up immediately

> and going into commander-in-chief mode, but really, the Pentagon handles

> these things. Standard operating procedure dictates the Secret Service

> should have sprung into action and whisked Bush out of the classroom, into

> a car and away to some secure location.

>

> The Secret Service should have assumed that the President would be the

> next target and at least take action as if that might be the case. The

> head of the FAA had just reported that there were 11 planes unaccounted

> for; and so there might have been 11 hijacked planes at that time. Yet the

> Secret Service did nothing. Bush went on national TV at about 9:30 for a

> prescheduled talk, and then they got in the limousine and went in the

> caravan on the normally scheduled route to the airport. When they got to

> the airport, they hadn't even called ahead to make sure there was jet

> fighter cover for Air Force One.

>

> What are some of the contradictions involving the attacks?

>

> One involves the story about the collapse of the World Trade Center

> buildings. We had three buildings collapse there, the North Tower [WTC I],

> the South Tower [WTC 2] and Building 7 [WTC 71. Each was a high-rise

> steel-frame building. Now, steel-frame high-rise buildings have never in

> the history of the universe been brought down by fire. And yet on this

> day, three of them were allegedly brought down by fire. There have been

> experiments with buildings raging with fire. In the experiments, fire made

> them sag a little, but never caused them to collapse. [see Madrid

> high-rise fire, page 34.] And yet on 9/11 these three buildings, which had

> relatively small fires in them, collapsed.

>

> People have the image of the South Tower in their minds, and they think,

> Oh, these were towering infernos. But most of the jet fuel exploded

> outside of the South Tower, which produced the really dramatic effect. But

> you have to remember, that effect only lasted for a few seconds, and the

> fuel burned up very quickly. In the South Tower there was relatively

> little fuel to feed the fire inside; so it would have had to be feeding on

> carpets, on desks and things like that. And yet the South Tower collapsed

> in less than an hour after it was hit.

>

> The collapse of Building 7 is particularly unusual, and yet the 9/11

> Commission never mentions it once in their report. Somehow fire got

> started in Building 7, which is two blocks away and was never hit by a

> plane. There was no jet fuel inside to feed the fire. There are

> photographs that show only small fires on floors 7 and 12 of this 47-story

> building. And yet at 5:20 in the afternoon it comes collapsing down in

> exactly the same way as the other buildings.

>

> Now I stress in the same way because they all came straight down into

> their own footprint for the most part. They collapsed very quickly, within

> about ten seconds. That's amazing when you think about it, that fire could

> produce that kind of effect, just like controlled demolition. In fact, on

> that very night, Dan Rather-viewing the collapse of Building 7-blurted

> out, " It looked just like one of those controlled demolitions. "

>

> Further evidence of Building 7 being brought down by controlled demolition

> came from Larry Silverstein, the man who had recently taken a lease on the

> entire complex. In a PBS documentary from September 2002, Silverstein said

> he told the fire commander that the smartest thing to do was " pull it. "

> Next, he says, they " made that decision to pull " and watched the building

> collapse. Pull is a term commonly used to describe using explosives to

> demolish a building. Silverstein allegedly made almost $500 million in

> profit from the collapse of Building 7.

>

> If the Twin Towers did come down by controlled demolition, wouldn't they

> have to be wired for the event well in advance of the attack?

>

> They would have had to be wired, and then closer to the time [of the

> attack] the explosives would actually have to be placed. Several people

> who worked in the towers reported that there were times [shortly before

> the attack] when a certain part of one tower or the other was sectioned

> off for several days, and no one could go there except these special

> workers who were called " engineers. " So it does appear that there could

> have been this kind of advance planning and that there would have been

> time to do this.

>

> Also, because of terrorist alerts, they had been taking bomb-sniffing dogs

> through the buildings, checking for explosives. There is a report that the

> bomb-sniffing dogs were called off the weekend prior to 9/11.

>

> Are there also inconsistencies involving the hijacked aircraft?

>

> Let's start with Flight 77, which is credited with crashing into the

> Pentagon. There are many problems with the official story, which is that

> it took off from Washington, D.C., went west, then got hijacked, then

> turned around and came hack. Somehow it flew through American airspace,

> toward the Pentagon for about 40 minutes, without being detected.

>

> Our multi-trillion-dollar defense system proved to be worthless. Even more

> striking, whatever hit the Pentagon hit the West Wing. These terrorists

> are supposedly so brilliant that they defeat this trillion-dollar system,

> and yet they didn't know that the West Wing was the worst part of the

> Pentagon to hit because all the top brass and Rumsfeld, whom you would

> presume they would want to kill, were in the East Wing.

>

> Secondly, the West Wing was being renovated. It had been reinforced; so

> fire would not spread from the West Wing to the other parts, causing much

> less damage. Furthermore, very few regular workers were there because of

> the renovation. Most of the people killed were civilian workers, not

> Pentagon employees. We were told that the facade of the West Wing was hit

> by this Boeing 757, which weighs 100 tons and was going 300 miles per

> hour. Yet the facade of the West Wing didn't collapse until a half hour

> later. Photographs taken by a Marine and an AP photographer show there was

> a relatively small hole in the facade. And we're supposed to believe the

> 757, with a 120-foot wingspan and 40-foot-high tail, went through there.

> The wreckage should he out on the yard, but the photographs show no Boeing

> visible.

>

> Were aircraft parts ever found in the Pentagon wreckage?

>

> 'There is clearly good evidence that plane parts were photographed in the

> Pentagon. But that they were parts from a Boeing 757 is highly and

> vigorously contested by many students of 'this event. What passes for the

> official story is that somehow this airplane hit the building, went into

> this tiny hole, which forced the wings back, and so they folded up and

> slipped inside the building.

>

> The fire chief in charge of putting out the fire was asked if he saw any

> plane parts inside. He said no big pieces, no fuselage, no engine, nothing

> like that. So the people who try to defend this story respond by saying

> the fire was so hot it vaporized the plane. It not only melted the steel

> and the aluminum, but it vaporized them; and that's why they disappeared.

>

> We've since learned that a lot of the bodies in the WTC were so destroyed

> that they were not able to identify them using any modern techniques. Yet

> this fire in the Pentagon that was hot enough to vaporize steel and

> aluminum left the bodies so they could be identified.

>

> If the government did allow or enable the 9/11 attacks, what is the

> motivation?

>

> The September 11 attacks are being used as the excuse for virtually

> everything the Bush/Cheney Administration is doing. Although Iraq had

> nothing to do with it-everybody agrees on that now-9/11 was used as the

> basis for this war. These guys had been champing at the bit to attack Iraq

> since 1992.

>

> In 1997 some of them formed The Project for the New American Century, a

> think tank that claims to promote American global leadership. This

> organization involved Cheney, Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld and many others who

> became central members and ideologues of the Bush Administration. In 2000

> the group produced a report titled " Rebuilding America's Defenses " that

> outlines transforming the military and points out that this will be very

> expensive.

>

> Since the Cold War is over, the report said, we don't have that excuse to

> keep military spending up. Many were talking about cutbacks on defense,

> i.e. military spending. Americans won't be willing to pony up money for

> defense unless there's an event that makes them feel insecure and

> threatened by external forces. Therefore, according to the report, any

> transformation of military affairs will go rather slowly, " absent some

> catastrophic and catalyzing event-like a new Pearl Harbor. "

>

> You've suggested that we will know what happened on 9/11 when those in

> power are arrested or forced to give sworn testimony. Who should that be?

>

> Cumulative evidence would seem to suggest that it was people such as Dick

> Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and General Richard Meyers who probably would have

> led the activities. Somebody had to give stand-down orders. Standard FAA

> operating procedures involve contacting the military if there's any sign a

> plane may have been hijacked, if a plane goes radically off course and

> they can't call it back, or if it loses radio contact or the transponder's

> turned off.

>

> The FAA calls the military, which calls the nearest Air Force base, which

> sends out jet fighters. They typically scramble a couple of fighters; and

> they have a regular routine where they tell the pilots you've been

> intercepted, follow me. If they won't comply, then the military pilot

> requests permission to take more drastic action. None of that happened on

> September 11. Not a single plane was intercepted. Normally, this occurs

> within about 15 minutes after signs of problems. In the case of Flight 77,

> after almost 40 minutes, there's no jet fighter on the scene.

>

> But it gets more problematic. In the-first few days we got three different

> stories about why there were no interceptions. The first story Meyers and

> NORAD [North American Aerospace Defense Command] told was that we didn't

> send planes up until after the Pentagon was hit. In other words, an hour

> and a half went by before any planes were scrambled. That story created

> lots of questions, and so they immediately changed it. On September 18,

> NORAD came out and said we did send up fighters, but the FAA was slow in

> contacting us, and we tried to get there in time, but didn't make it.

>

> Then researchers examined the timelines. Those jets can go from scramble

> order to 29,000 feet in 2.5 minutes and fly 1,850 miles an hour, which

> means they should have arrived in time, even if the FAA was late.

>

> With the 9/11 Commission, we get a third story from the military, which is

> the FAA didn't notify us late; they didn't notify us at all. More

> precisely, they had only nine minutes notice with Flight 11, the first

> flight, and no notice about the other three flights until after they had

> crashed. Of course, this ignores the fact that the military has a radar

> system by their own account that is far superior to that of the FAA. But

> for now this is the official story.

>

> Are there also inconsistencies regarding Flight 93, the airliner that

> crashed in Pennsylvania?

>

> With the first three flights the question is, why weren't they intercepted

> or possibly shot down? With Flight 93 the question is, why does it seem

> the government shot this plane down after it appeared the passengers were

> about to wrest control of it? There was a certified pilot aboard as a

> passenger who would have been able to bring the plane down safely. You

> would have had live people, presumably live hijackers, to interrogate.

>

> There's an enormous amount of evidence that Flight 93 was shot down. The

> government denied it. It's strange that they did, because they could have

> said, " This plane was heading toward the Pentagon or the White House, and

> we were protecting Washington, doing our job. " For some reason they chose

> to deny that they had shot it down; and that became the official story. In

> the 9/11 Commission Report they do big-time damage control and remove the

> possibility that it could have been shot down by changing the timelines

> rather drastically.

>

> Everybody knows and agrees that Cheney gave the shoot-down order. Prior to

> the 9/11 Commission Report, we were led to believe that permission was

> given at about 9:45. Many news reports suggest that the shoot-down order

> was given before 10 a.m. By his own testimony, Cheney was in charge, down

> in the underground bunker-the emergency operation center.

>

> Norman Mineta, Secretary of Transportation, testified that when he got

> down to the underground bunker at about 9:20, Cheney was already there and

> had been there for some time. That supports the view that he got down

> there at least by 9:15. The 9/11 Commission ignores that evidence and says

> Cheney didn't get there until almost 10 a.m. and issued the order after

> 10:lO a.m. They conclude the military couldn't possibly have shot down

> Flight 93 because it went down at 10:03 or 10:06.

>

> Standard operating procedures don't require a call from the President; the

> Pentagon chain of command can do it. So Rumsfeld, Meyers or a subordinate

> could have done it. In any case, they created the idea that only the

> President or the Vice President could order it. This is one of the biggest

> lies in the 9/11 Commission Report.

>

> Do you think the truth will ever come out?

>

> It is extremely difficult to get the truth to come out in America because

> the mainstream media are not only co-opted, but accomplices in these

> matters. This is understandable because we have a corporate-owned media.

>

> Take NBC, for example, which is owned by General Electric, one of the

> major producers of military equipment in the world. It's very unlikely

> you're going to get some reporter on NBC to expose this stuff. Thus far

> we've seen nothing about this in any mainstream magazine, newspaper or

> television show in this country.

>

> An international commission with prestigious people would be able to

> command attention-so much so that even the American press would be unable

> to ignore it.

>

> *******************************************

>

> 2. Outrageous Conspiracy Theories: Report on a Conversation with Philip

> Zelikow

>

> by Thomas Hansen, Ph.D., Charlottesville, Virginia, thansen103

> On the web:

> http://www.septembereleventh.org/newsarchive/2005-06-07-outrageous.php

>

> It is nearly a year since the 9/11 Commission report was finished and the

> investigation of the events of 9/11 officially came to a close. But

> unofficially, many Americans have unanswered questions, and at least some

> of this hesitancy to close the book on 9/11 is because of the

> long-standing connection between the Bush Administration and the man who

> was the Executive Director of the 9/11 Commission, Dr. Philip Zelikow.

>

> In a new book by Professor Emeritus David Ray Griffin of the Claremont

> School of Theology (The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions,

> Olive Branch Press, 2005), the case is made that the staff of the 9/11

> Commission acted as gatekeepers who followed the official explanation of

> events of 9/11, rather than acting as true independent investigators.

> Griffin gives detailed and abundant evidence that he feels shows Philip

> Zelikow and his staff did not thoroughly investigate information that was

> contrary to what the Bush Administration had already accepted as the facts

> of 9/11.

>

> Last fall I had a conversation with Zelikow, which I feel supports the

> ideas and evidence of Professor Griffin’s book. But before I go into what

> Dr. Zelikow told me in person, let us look at the facts of Zelikow’s

> association with members of the Bush Administration over the past 15

> years. The reason I present this “bio” of Dr. Zelikow is that, while we

> expect any person might receive a job offer based on whom they have worked

> with and have known in the past, this was not an ordinary job. This job

> was to oversee the official investigation of a most serious and

> consequential crime, and it occurred under the watch of President Bush’s

> Administration. Dr. Philip Zelikow, despite his fine record of integrity

> and scholarship, was clearly not independent from the Bush Administration.

> And since Bush, Cheney and Rice were three of the witnesses who testified

> before the Commission, their relationship with Zelikow is relevant.

>

> Dr. Zelikow was on the National Security Council of President George H.W.

> Bush in the 1980s, working as an aide to National Security Advisor Brent

> Scowcroft. Condoleeza Rice was also an aide, working with Zelikow. In

> 1997, Zelikow and Rice co-authored a book. Also in the 1990s, Zelikow

> directed the Aspen Strategy Group, which included Rice, Scowcroft, Dick

> Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and others. Then after President George W. Bush was

> elected in 2000, Zelikow was appointed to the National Security Council

> transition team to provide recommendations to Rice as she accepted the

> position of National Security Advisor to Bush. Shortly after 9/11, Zelikow

> was appointed to President Bush’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. In

> 2003, he was appointed Executive Director of the 9/11 Commission, and took

> a leave from his position as Director of the Miller Center of Public

> Affairs at the University of Virginia.

>

> After the 9/11 Commission Report was finished in July 2004, and the

> Commission was dissolved, Zelikow returned to his previous Miller Center

> position for a few months. Recently he left the Miller Center job

> completely and became Counselor of the Department of State, as announced

> by new Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on February 25, 2005. To quote

> Rice in the U.S. State Department press release of that day, “Philip and I

> have worked together for years, and I value his counsel and expertise. I

> appreciate his willingness to take on this assignment.” To quote the State

> Department press release, “Though the position has been vacant since 2001,

> the office of the Counselor is not new, having been part of the

> Department’s organization since 1909. The Counselor is a principal officer

> of the Department. As Counselor, Dr. Zelikow will serve as a senior policy

> advisor on a wide range of issues and will undertake special assignments

> as directed by the Secretary.”

>

> So we see from these facts that Philip Zelikow’s work with members of the

> Bush Administration preceded his 9/11 Commission work for 15 years, and it

> has now resumed again, fulltime. Apparently, we are supposed to assume

> that during 2003-2004, when he was Executive Director of the 9/11

> Commission, he was NOT “associated with” members of the Bush

> Administration as he had been before, and is again now. He was somehow

> able to distance himself from his past relationship with them, oversee the

> interviews of many witnesses, thoroughly investigate all of the evidence,

> and supervise the writing of the final 9/11 Commission Report without

> being influenced by his past association with them. And now he has been

> able to re-associate with them in good stead and be re-hired by the Bush

> Administration fulltime in an important position.

>

> Dr. Zelikow gave a lecture at the Miller Center at UVA on September 10,

> 2004, titled, “The Road to 9/11,” and another on October 14, titled, “The

> Road From 9/11.” I attended the second of the two lectures and had an

> opportunity afterwards to have a conversation with him for several

> minutes. Among other things, I asked him why the Commission did not report

> more evidence that would answer the specific conspiracy concerns and

> questions that have been circulating regarding 9/11. I asked him why the

> Commission would let these concerns go unanswered and cause unnecessary

> doubt and dissent in the country.

>

> I pointed out to Dr. Zelikow that one of many reasons this conspiracy talk

> about 9/11 continues is that there have been no photos released of the

> Boeing 757 wreckage inside the Pentagon, or outside either, as we normally

> see after a civilian plane crash. I asked if he has seen photos that show

> the wreckage of the 757. He said, yes, they have photos, and that he has

> seen them, and he also said that there are eyewitness reports from a dozen

> or so rescue workers at the Pentagon who confirm seeing those airplane

> parts in the wreckage. Well, I asked, can I or some other ordinary person

> see these photos? He said no. I asked if I could see the rescue worker’s

> statements, and he said no. I told him I had seen photos of the exterior

> Pentagon wall before it collapsed, and the hole where the plane entered

> appeared to be only about 20 feet in diameter, with unbroken window frames

> on either side of it where the wings and engines would have hit. This hole

> was much too small for a 757 to enter, and no wreckage of the plane is

> shown on the ground outside. He said those photos might have been

> “adjusted” in scale by someone to give the wrong impression. I asked if I

> or anyone else could see the National Transportation Safety Board report

> about the crash, or even about the 757 being picked up by radar as it

> approached Washington, and he said no. He said that the air traffic

> controllers at Dulles saw on their radar that a plane was approaching,

> without its transponder turned on, but they could not identify it just by

> radar. It was not one scheduled to come into Dulles, so they assumed it

> was landing at Reagan National, and when it dropped off their radar at the

> Pentagon they knew something was wrong. This was 35 minutes after the

> second World Trade Center Tower had been hit. I told him this explanation

> defied reason, but he said it is proven in the NTSB Report, which I can’t

> see.

>

> I told Dr. Zelikow that this secrecy of the 9/11 Commission is still

> fueling conspiracy theories and distrust throughout the country and around

> the world. Then I asked him why he and the Commission and the staff don’t

> simply release photos and other information to the public so that we can

> rest assured that the Commission has fully investigated and answered these

> and other persistent questions. His answer was that the staff, including

> himself of course as Executive Director, made a conscious decision not to

> dignify these “outrageous conspiracy theories” by investigating them or

> reporting on them. In my opinion, this statement by Dr. Zelikow lends

> credence to Professor Griffin’s charge that Zelikow’s staff acted as a

> filter of what would be investigated and reported. Dr. Zelikow then told

> me he could see my point about the public wanting to know more, and he

> said he would go back to the Commission staff and re-visit the question of

> what to release. We’re still waiting.

>

> Americans are concerned about the unanswered questions of 9/11. The

> reputable polling firm, Zogby International, conducted a poll of State of

> New York citizens in August 2004. Results showed that 49.3% of New York

> City residents and 41% of New York citizens overall said that some of our

> leaders “Knew in advance that attacks were planned on or around September

> 11, 2001, and that they consciously failed to act.” Nearly 30% of

> registered Republicans agreed with this statement, despite the serious

> legal and political implications. Only 36% of the total respondents

> believed that the 9/11 Commission had “answered all the important

> questions about what actually happened on September 11th,” and 66% want

> another full investigation of the “still unanswered questions.”

>

> CSPAN2 recently broadcast, and rebroadcast, the speech Professor Griffin

> gave about his book to a standing-room-only crowd at the University of

> Wisconsin. People are paying attention and learning and speaking up. As

> the 9/11 Commission Report approaches its 1-year anniversary, many

> Americans are not celebrating, nor are they letting it all just fade away.

> We pay the salaries of those who have made conscious decisions to

> investigate and report only what fits their own version of 9/11 events,

> and their own vision of what the world should be like for them. It seems

> that “we the people” are considered by some officials to be just

> bystanders, without the right to see the evidence that our leaders have

> seen, and to decide for ourselves what is true. The Bush Administration

> has demonstrated a pervasive pattern of secrecy, deception, and arrogance,

> not just related to the 9/11 investigation. They have left the rest of us

> in the dark, but we can see well enough to fear that the Emperor has no

> clothes.

>

> *******************************************

>

> 3. A Personal Decision, by 9/11 Whistleblower Kevin Ryan

>

> On the web: http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0506/S00144.htm

>

> Have you ever found yourself caught between several hundred million people

> and their most cherished lies? After writing a letter to a government

> scientist, pleading with him to clarify a report of his work, I found

> myself in just that situation. The letter was circulated on the internet

> and for a brief time I became a reluctant celebrity. Of course I stand

> behind what I wrote, although it was originally intended as a personal

> message, not an open letter. Since many have asked for clarification, here

> is my message to all.

>

> To me, the report in question represents a decision point, not just for

> the US, but for humanity as a whole. We're at a point where we must decide

> if we will live consciously, or literally give up our entire reality for a

> thin veneer of lies. In the US these lies include cheap propaganda that

> passes for journalism, police-state measures that promise security, and

> mountains of debt that paint a picture of wealth. Additionally we've

> adopted many implicit self-deceptions, like the idea that we'll always

> enjoy a limitless share of the world's resources, no matter where these

> are located or who might disagree.

>

> All people lie to themselves. It's one of the most important things we

> have yet to accept about our own nature. We lie to ourselves to justify

> our past actions, to protect our self-image, and to promote ourselves

> relative to others. This lying is at the root of many of our problems

> (e.g. nationalism and racism). Until we see this, and strive to

> understand if not control it, the resulting problems will continue

> unchecked and the outcome will be certain. Any organism or society that

> makes self-deception its modus operandi will make many bad, and ultimately

> fatal, decisions. The day will come when we are collectively fooling

> ourselves in such a way that we essentially trade everything we have for

> what's behind our fantasy curtain. It appears that day is near.

>

> The official conspiracy theory of 9/11 is a key part of our current

> self-deception. More importantly, this story may be our last chance to see

> just how critical our situation is so that we can all stop, and begin

> working together to solve the real problems we face. These problems, for

> the US and the world as a whole, amount to a growing storm of factors

> including environmental changes, resource depletion, and growth in

> resource usage.[1,2] Undoubtedly the secret Energy Taskforce report of

> May 2001 would verify this, and help us to understand that our government

> is responding to some of these threats with a carefully laid out plan.

> This plan assumes that people cannot rise above their own natural,

> ego-based self-deception, and therefore few of us will survive the coming

> storm. In essence, they're betting against us.

>

> Anyone who honestly looks at the evidence has difficulty finding anything

> in the official story of 9/11 that is believable. It's not just one or two

> strange twists or holes in the story, the whole thing is bogus from start

> to end.[3] In my previous job I was in a position to question one part,

> the collapse of three tall buildings due to fire. But this isn't really a

> chemistry or engineering problem, and may be best approached initially

> through statistics.

>

> The three WTC buildings in question weren't all designed the same way and

> weren't all hit by airplanes. The only thing they seemed to have in common

> were relatively small and manageable fires, as indicated by the work of

> firefighters right up to the moment of collapse. From the government's

> report we know that only a small percentage of the supporting columns in

> each of the first two buildings were severed, and that the jet fuel burned

> off in just a few minutes.

>

> To follow the latest 'leading hypothesis', what are the odds that all the

> fireproofing fell off in just the right places, even far from the point of

> impact? Without much test data, let's say it's one in a thousand. And what

> are the odds that the office furnishings converged to supply highly

> directed and (somehow) forced-oxygen fires at very precise points on the

> remaining columns? Is it another one in a thousand? What is the chance

> that those points would then all soften in unison, and give way perfectly,

> so that the highly dubious 'progressive global collapse' theory could be

> born? I wouldn't even care to guess. But finally, with well over a hundred

> fires in tall buildings through history, what are the chances that the

> first, second and third incidents of fire-induced collapse would all occur

> on the same day? Let's say it's one in a million. Considering just these

> few points we're looking at a one in a trillion chance, using generous

> estimates and not really considering the third building (no plane, no jet

> fuel, different construction).

>

> How convenient that our miraculous result, combined with several other

> trains of similarly unlikely events, gives us reason to invade the few

> most strategically important lands for the production of oil and natural

> gas. As I said, this is not about chemistry or engineering. Our continued

> dependence on this highly improbable story means that we have a desperate

> need to believe it. It is, in fact, a psychology problem.

>

> Solving the problem is a personal challenge, and involves at least

> three-steps. First, we have to admit we were wrong, and that we were

> fooled. This is not easy for most people, but congratulations to the

> neo-cons for noticing that their political opponents seem to be least able

> to admit they were wrong on any significant issue. Secondly, we have to

> see that terrorism is actually much worse than we feared because the

> terrorists are in charge. Such a pause on a national scale would be

> dramatic to say the least. If we get to the third step we begin to

> realize the scope of change necessary to move forward in a conscious

> manner. Obviously the US government must be substantially changed and/or

> forgiven. New cooperative, multinational agreements would need to be

> implemented immediately.[4]

>

> If you make it through step one and care enough about people to work for

> step three, you may face ridicule and isolation. You may lose your income

> and some friends, but if we continue down the same path there's a real

> chance you're going to lose those anyway. On the upside you may be able to

> hold on to some sense of integrity. The only thing you can be certain of

> is that we're all in this together. No matter how you voted, what

> credentials or positions you hold, or what faith you have in people, you

> will face the consequences of our collective self-deceptions. Now is the

> time for each of us to decide between a stormy reality and what's behind

> the fantasy curtain.

>

> *******************************************

>

> 4. Narco Dollars for Beginners, with Catherine Austin Fitts

>

> A message from Emanuel Sferios, Webmaster, 9/11 Visibility Project

>

> I am sure many rs to the 9/11 Visibility Project mailing list are

> familiar with Catherine Austin Fitts of Solari.com. We have forwarded a

> number of her articles in previous announcements and newsletters. For

> those who aren't aware, Catherine produces regular, 75-minute audio

> seminars on various topics. Last Thursday I had the privilege of hosting

> her most recent seminar called " Narco Dollars for Beginners, " based on her

> most popular and widely published article by the same name. As part of a

> series designed specifically for activists to better understand the real

> deal in economic warfare, Catherine is offering the seminar to 9/11

> Visibility Project rs for half off the regular, $20 price. So for

> $10 you can download and listen to the mp3 file from the solari store

> website. Use the following link, and after adding " Narco Dollars for

> Beginners " to your shopping cart, simply type " 911vis " in the coupon code

> box at the bottom of the page (without the quotation marks) and then click

> checkout button. The 9/11 Visibility Project supports Catherine and the

> work she is doing, and we strongly encourage you to check out this audio

> seminar. Here's the link:

>

> https://www.rnserve.net/solari/product.php?productid=20 & partner=911vis

>

> *******************************************

>

> 5. 9/11 Truth in Higher Education: A call to students & faculty

>

> Institutions of higher education have, for the most part, failed to

> carefully examine the official explanation of the events of 9/11. After a

> brief period of introspection, university faculty and students have gone

> back to business as usual. And yet, we now all live in a post 9/11 world.

> Institutions of higher education have a special responsibility to pursue

> the truth wherever it leads. In this spirit, a number of colleges,

> universities, and seminaries have already committed themselves to taking a

> closer, more critical, look at the events of 9/11 and the official

> explanation of these events. If you are a student or faculty member at a

> college, university, or seminary and would like to become involved in this

> project, please contact Dr. Marcus Ford, Professor of Humanities at

> Northern Arizona University, at mpf1950 for more information.

> We need individuals who can secure an on campus location, facilitate

> discussion, distribute information, and so on.

>